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Comments, possibly informed.

Tim Wilson
Daytona Beach, Florida, USA
timatollah@mackandtim.net
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Yow! Bush "Intimidated" by Gay Journalists. TAPPED sends the world to this piece at TownHall.com where Brent Bozell unloads the goofy idea that President Bush was intimidated-- that's right, "intimidated" is his word choice -- by the presence of openly gay reporters on the campaign trail in 2000.

See for yourself. Here's an excerpt:

When George W. Bush campaigned in 2000, trailed daily by openly gay reporter Frank Bruni, and also analyzed by openly gay national correspondent Rick Berke, what effect did that have on how he handled homosexuality on the stump? One could argue it thoroughly intimidated him. He barely mentioned it then, and he's barely touched on it up to this day.

And the intimidated attitude continues. When social conservatives push against same-sex marriage, the ACLU marches around with press releases quoting Dick Cheney pooh-poohing any resistance. The tiny splinter of gay activist Log Cabin Republicans are getting special meetings at the White House, while GOP House and Senate campaign officials kiss their rings and tell them how important they are. This wouldn't happen if Republicans weren't petrified with being tagged "anti-gay" by the media elite, which is a very short step from being labeled "far right."

To characterize one of the two major-party candidates as "intimidated" by the presence of one or more homosexual reporters in the coverage pool just seems goofy. We're talking about someone who became President of the USA.

It's not necessarily being "intimidated" or even what's easily called politically correct to pay attention to interests outside some narrow scope of what was once perceived as one's base. It's called expansive and inclusive politics. So the Bush White House might be taking a little extra care to make sure it doesn't put its foot in its mouth regarding issues of importance to gay people. While that doesn't make them toadies to gay interests and gay lobbies, it might indicate some small degree of independence and refusal to toady to the interests and lobbies of the looney right.

I thought the right viewed itself as smarter and more clearly thinking than the left. Well, the above is one example of someone on the right who doesn't seem to understand the difference between a perceived (possibly imagined) correlation and what is being claimed as causation. Oh well, at least it makes again clear what some on the far right perceive as their issue of import.

posted by Tim Wilson at 11:03 AM